...is what this article made me think as it really caught my eye ...... I think I want to go to this kindergarten. Click here for the whole article. Kathy
What does a school do with 5- and 6-year-old kids?
The old answer was coax them into little chairs — at least until “creative time" — keep 'em relatively organized, and keep a lid on their natural enthusiasm. Basically a constant riot-control situation. And a first taste of standardized education.
But kindergarteners don't need to be forced to learn — really, they can't stop learning.
So educators in Tokyo had a different idea.
Architect Takaharu Tezuka explains in a TEDx Kyoto talk how one school created a kindergarten that doesn't fight against kids' natural impulses. It counts on them.
The roof is a giant ring of a playground. Why? Kids love to run in circles.
The single, continuous classroom has no walls.
Teachers asked kids to use crates to create their own areas, but somehow it didn't quite manage to get done.
The design has child psychology in mind.
Kids can get anxious when they feel walled-in or constrained. That doesn't happen here. And since little dynamos thrive in environments with lots of noise, they've come to the right place — there are no acoustic barriers.
“The principal says, 'If the boy in the corner don't want to stay in the room, we let him go. And he'll come back eventually because the circle comes back.'" — Takaharu Tezuka
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